I’ve just been marveling over this little gem of insight that I wrote 4 years ago. I’ve left it entirely unchanged, except to add a single comma in a sentence that would have been extremely confusing otherwise. I basically agree with the majority of what I wrote and wish I could think still with such clarity now. Would love to get comments and discussion.
I have tried to permit myself to live in a fake reality. I create fake realities all the time. Sometimes I log-in to facebook to look at something and then log-off immediately so that no one notices that I was logged-in. I do this to appear as though I have not logged-in to facebook, to pretend that it never happened. A thing cannot have happened and not-happened. Thus I create a fake reality.
Once a fake reality has been created, it is often necessary to created several other fake realities to defend the first. For instance, if I want to appear as though I have not been online looking at facebook I must pretend that I was engaged in some other activity (I must have an alibi). I must also pretend that I am ignorant to anything I may have discovered while looking at facebook. In this way, I am obligated to create more fake realities for the sake of confirming the first.
I realize that I have always striven to appear virtuous. It has never been important whether I was actually virtuous or not, only whether or not I appeared so to other people. This can only mean that I valued the opinions of others more than I valued my self and virtuousness.
How did I come to be this way? A lifetime of learning to meet the world’s expectations… Instead of actually meeting the world’s expectations however, I have learned the short-cut of appearing to meet the world’s expectations, which is sometimes all the world expects. For example, the commandment “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all” requires that a person only appear to act nice, but not that a person actually act nice. If a teacher warns you not to let her/him catch you chewing gum, it is not the act of chewing gum she has forbidden, it is the act of appearing to chew gum which she has forbidden. She expects only that you appear to be doing what she “expects” … not to catch you chewing gum. By this standard of expectations, dishonesty, deceit, and contempt for intelligence is bred.
Slowly, I have realized these facts of my existence, and slowly, I have tried to change. My purpose in changing grows clearer all the time. I realize that I must have a goal in mind before the desired changes can begin to take shape. Thus, I desire to live virtuously in the only reality which truly exists. It is necessary to first live in reality as it truly exists before one can be virtuous. Thus, and as a matter of foremost importance, I must not deceive myself or others. I must not live in a fake reality. Only after I have acknowledged reality as it truly is can I consciously seek to be virtuous.
Why ought I to be virtuous? (since Ought = “is necessary”)
Only by being virtuous can I survive in this reality. If I am not virtuous I have surely given myself to death.